Recent Healthcare Advocacy

High deductible health insurance has resulted in what I call “the Functionally Un-Insured.” Deductibles and co-pays (that part of a patient’s medical bill that he or she will have to write a check for) have been rising since 2007. Many

By Vernon Rowe Someone asked me the other day why I love Clinical Neurology. The short answer is it gives me immense enjoyment at all levels. The long answer involves the concept of “flow.” Here’s how: I enter a patient’s

By Elizabeth Rowe, Ph.D, M.B.A. A recent study in JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association) has addressed directly for the first time, the effects of hospital ownership of physicians’ groups compared to physician owned groups on costs for HMO

By Elizabeth S. Rowe, Ph.D., M.B.A. MedPAC finds High Hospital Charges and Costs, NOT Higher Volume, makes US Healthcare more expensive than the rest of the world. This year’s agenda for MedPAC (The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, which advises Congress

by Vernon Rowe and Aaron Seacat Healthcare and Baseball are alike in many ways, and this similarity was driven home when the Kansas City Royals, against all odds, won the American League pennant. Healthcare and Baseball are ponderous institutions, with

Rural Americans pay more for Rural Health Care because of the CMS policy of paying so-called “critical path” hospitals far more than independent physicians for the same services. And paradoxically, this policy decreases access to care for these Americans. The

Dr. Vernon Rowe is a member of the AMA House of Delegates, representing the American Society of Neuroimaging. Many members of the AMA still doubt that Obamacare, or The Affordable Care Act, will succeed in the long run. They believe

Over the course of the past decade the medical industry has witnessed a trend that has disturbed many health insurers and health economists concerned with the cost of healthcare for privately insured patients: An ever-growing number of hospitals are purchasing

Steven Brill writes in Time Magazine that hospital profit margins are extraordinarily high for supposedly non-profit institutions, and are largely responsible for the rising health care costs in the United States.